Suicide Bombers Attack Lebanese Soldiers Near Syria Border

BEIRUT, Lebanon — Five suicide bombers attacked Lebanese soldiers searching for militants in refugee settlements near the border with Syria on Friday, the army said, and the explosions killed a girl and wounded a number of soldiers.

The attacks shook the makeshift camps that have grown near the Lebanese border town of Arsal as refugees have poured in to escape the war in Syria. Militants holed up in the area, which is isolated and mountainous, have launched attacks on army positions.

The military raids on Friday were the latest effort by the Lebanese Army to bring the area under its control and arrest militants who Lebanese officials said they believed were plotting attacks elsewhere in the country.

In remarks released by the National News Agency of Lebanon, the army said its troops had sustained a number of attacks during the raids on the camps. One bomber detonated his explosive belt in front of an army patrol, wounding three soldiers. Four others blew themselves up without wounding any soldiers, but one of the explosions killed a girl living in one of the camps. Another militant threw a grenade at a patrol, wounding four soldiers.

Lebanon, a country of 4.5 million people, has taken in more than a million Syrians, giving it the highest refugee population per capita in the world.

While Arsal has been the site of frequent clashes between militants and the Lebanese Army, the violence has not spread to the wider population of refugees, most of whom live in squalid conditions or informal settlements in Lebanon’s poorest areas, where the government and aid organizations struggle to provide for them.